What the Haps?

Isn't that how the kids these days say "What's happening?" Well, frankly, a lot. As my brain is abuzz with all sorts of haps, I can think of nothing else and shall catch you up on the latest haps with me and Infinity Crossing. Ready, set, go!

Benefit Haps

KryptoNight was a raging success, thanks to the hard work of Dulce Mar Events and the loving support of our local community. It was so nice to see some of you there! We were able to give a nice gift to Graham and send him tidal waves of love from the good time we all had in his honor. His recovery efforts are not even close to over, though. If you weren't able to attend KryptoNight, and even if you did, you may make a donation directly to the Graham Faught Recovery Fund at any time. We can't thank you all enough for your ongoing support!

Check out some photos from the event. Can anyone tell me who that redhead is??

North Shore Yoga Haps

This week, I'm out at Maya Yoga Studio for Nicki Doane's Asana Intensive, and boy is it intense! We've got a full room of sweaty yogis doing lots of Spring Cleaning, if you will. These intensives happen throughout the year and are a great way to get a nice, big dose of yoga with world-renowned teachers and still have the rest of your day free for fun stuff or work or both. I always love taking this time because it's usually jam-packed with those little "Aha!" moments, revealing previously hidden layers of detail in my yoga practice. It can be finding the inner edge of the knuckle of my index finger in downward dog and connecting that to a line all the way up my spine, or it can be some nugget of wisdom that I'm sure I've heard a thousand times before but only just really "heard." I always walk away feeling like PopEye on a fresh can of spinach! Perhaps you can tell that I highly recommend it.

Upcoming Haps

As you may or may not know, Infinity Crossing also does websites and we've got a big one coming up in the next couple of months. We're working so much on this, my head's spinning! This will be the first in a suite of websites we envision as a network of online access to a broad spectrum of health and healing. I'm afraid that's all I can spill at the moment, but stay tuned: this baby's on it's way!

Sanity Haps

In the midst of all these happenings, I'm clinging to my anchors with all my might and intention. You remember the anchors, right? Those little things we do that keep us sane and in the moment when everything else is a bit nutty. Check it out here. I don't know exactly why, but Nadi Shodhana has just been a consistently solid anchor for me in all my busy-ness. In fact, I think I'll go do some right now. Stay sane out there, folks!!

NAMASTE!

KryptoNight!

Our very first benefit concert arrives this very week, my friends! Merry in May, Vol. 1 is called "KryptoNight" and it's all goin' down this Saturday, May 11th. Get dressed up and come on out to support our friend, Graham Faught's recovery. Tickets and info here.

SEE YOU THERE... NAMASTE!

Spotlight on Garudasana

Legend has it that Garuda was the king of the birds: a great eagle with the features of a man who carried Vishnu, the Sustainer, across the Earth. Though garuda is usually translated as “eagle,” another translation means “devourer,” referring to the consuming fire of the sun’s rays. If you’ve ever taken a look at an eagle’s eyes, this makes sense: you’ll find a burning fire there held steady by fierce majesty. The Garuda of myth was fiercely compassionate, strong, protective, and loyal: a conquerer of all dangers. Don’t you want some of that feeling? Yes, please!

Benefits and Tips

Garudasana is a pose with a little bit of everything: balance, strength, and flexibility. It strengthens the feet and the joints of the legs, while stretching the upper back and shoulders. This is a terrific pose that can be done anytime to sharpen your focus, connect with your breathing patterns, and get grounded. Garudasana asks us to steady our breath and our gaze, and in turn, lends us a steady mind. A receptive strength fuels this pose, so don’t be too hard on yourself if you wobble. Just give it a little smile, take a deep breath, and try again. Typically, when our balance is challenged, the tendency is to hold our breath in an effort to hold on to the pose. However, the balance is always in the breath. Smooth, steady breath creates a smooth, steady posture. So, keep breathing as we do this pose! 

Contraindications

This pose may not be appropriate for you if you have a recent injury to the ankle, knee, or shoulder, or if you have low blood pressure.  

To Begin

Stand in samasthi, equal standing. Bring equal weight into both feet, from front to back and right to left. Stand with strong legs. See if you can create the feeling of a lift in the floor of your pelvis, the action of mula bandha. Find a corresponding feeling of drawing back and up from very low and deep in your abdomen, the action of uddiyana bandha. Stand tall and soften your jaw. Let your gaze, drishti, be steady and focused on a point ahead of you, ideally just above the level of your eyes. Breathe freely through your nose.  

The Legs

Bring your hands to your hips and shift your weight to your left foot. Bend your left knee a little and cross your right leg over your left thigh above the knee. If possible, wrap the front of your right shin around the back of your left calf, and hook your right toes around your left calf. If this isn’t possible, just do the best you can while keeping your balance steady with your breath and your focused gaze. 

The Arms

Inhale and reach your arms wide out to the side, palms facing up, like a bird spreading its wings. Exhale, bring your arms to the center, and cross your straight right arm over your straight left arm above the level of the elbow. Bend your elbows. Pass your hands across each other (right hand moves to the right, left hand is closer to you and moves to the left). Spin your palms so they face each other, and bring your hands together so they touch. The fingertips of your left hand will just graze the base of the fingers on your right hand. Bring your fingers together and spread the skin on your palms. Lift your elbows, descend your shoulders, and reach your hands up and away from you. Remember to keep breathing!

The Full Pose

Play with the bend of your left knee: some people like it bent more, some people prefer it straighter. Find what best supports your balance. Remember the actions of mula and uddiyana bandha here: a lift in the floor of your pelvis supports a drawing back and up of the very low abdomen, just above the pubic bone. Lift your sternum and soften your jaw. The final piece is to bring your gaze to your own hands. Breathe freely and feel like that majestic eagle for which this pose is named: strong, focused, and poised for whatever may come. Unwind from the pose slowly and with grace, and do the other side. 

NAMASTE!

Sutra Sagacity I.12: The Scientific Method

Ooh, ooh, guess what! We've come up on a few of my absolute favorite yoga sutras. I know it's been a little tedious to run through the types of vrttis, but now that we know what we're dealing with, we find out how to get to the nirodhah of yogas-citta-vrtti-nirodhah (yoga quiets and soothes the fluctuations of the mind). Yeah, this is just starting to get good! Grab your popcorn and sutra books, kids, and settle on in for

Patanjali's Yoga Sutra I.12

Images from Chip Hartranft's The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali."

Images from Chip Hartranft's The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali."

"Practice and non-attachment make still the fluctuations of the mind."

Ok, now we're getting somewhere. We've been through this real snoozer of a list of the fivefold types of vrttis:

And now, we actually look at the how of stilling those darn vrttis. To me, this sutra has the scientific method written all up in it, but I'll get to that in a moment. First, let's just break it down into its constituent parts.

Here, Patanjali tells us that the quieting of the fluctuations of the mind is the product of the interaction of two things: practice and non-attachment. The most obvious sense of practice in this context is the practice of yoga. However, we crazy Westerners have to keep in mind that the practice of yoga does not merely refer to asana: there are 7 whole other limbs of yoga: encompassing personal and social observances, harnessing of the breath, withdrawal of the senses, concentration, meditation, and self realization. Don't worry, we'll get to all that in Book II in, oh, 6 years or so. The point for now is that the practice of yoga is something that is many-faceted and reflects awareness into all aspects of our lives. I think we all have some inkling of just how much there is to do on the practice side of things, and we're all working on it (clearly, because you're reading a yoga blog)! 

Then, we have non-attachment. Ah yes, that maddening old concept that never fails to conjure images of a monk in ochre robes. Here, I think of non-attachment in 2 particular senses: non-attachment to our observations in this world and non-attachment to the results of our actions. The former ensures that we are able to sit back and observe things, events, people, and ourselves without judgment, but rather as they are. And the latter helps us to act without rigid expectation of certain results, for it's easy to see how our strongly held expectations usually lead to suffering in some form or another. So, non-attachment allows us to observe the things of this world in the present moment as they are and frees us from clinging to certain expectations of those things.

This really fits beautifully with the concept of the scientific method, lending a lot of credence in my mind to the assertion that yoga is an art and a science. It's like this:

  1. As we practice in the world, we observe it and ourselves without attachment to what we find or our reflexive judgments therein.
  2. We are curious about those things we observe, and we ask questions.
  3. To our questions, we form hypotheses, without attachment to their validity.
  4. We take our hypotheses and apply our practices to them in a deliberate way: we experiment, we go through trial and error.
  5. We observe, without attachment to being right or wrong, whether our hypotheses hold up in practice.
  6. We repeat this process over and over again.

Pretty neat, huh? I think so. I've always fancied myself a scientist: I just didn't imagine that instead of that microscope I had when I was a kid, my instruments would actually look more like a sticky mat and a sutra book. Seeing how the tools for stilling the mind are really just another scientific method helps me apply what I glean from yoga in a practical way throughout my life, every single day. It almost calls for a "What would yoga do?" bracelet to remind us to set aside our attachments and act through what we learn in our practice. When we adopt this as our method, we come to know for a fact that our yoga is a tangible way to navigate our lives, and I think that's a beautiful thing.  

NAMASTE!

"All things arise, suffer change, and pass away. This is their nature. When you know this, nothing perturbs you, nothing hurts you. You become still. It is easy." (Ashtavakara Gita)

Breath Seeds

Before we get to the blog, we have some winners to announce... Mahalo to these ladies for participating in our oh-so-exciting KrytoNight benefit concert giveaway. Drumroll please...

Grand Prize (2 tickets to KryptoNight): Terry Ann Heller

Runners up (1 shwag bag of essential oils each): Cathleen Nardi and Ona Mai Kyrie

Tickets for our 1st annual benefit concert are on sale now at Maui Kombucha in Haiku. Get yours before they’re gone, and help support Graham Faught’s Recovery Fund!

On to the blog...

As you may or may not know by now, Infinity Crossing is all about the intersection of yoga and life. It’s the crossroads where your yoga practice meets your everyday life head-on, and the two cease to be separate entities, but rather converge and become one. Many of you are probably familiar with how compartmentalized our yoga practice can be in the beginning: yoga is just something we do when we roll out a sticky mat in a studio and follow along with a teacher and other people. Then, when we roll up the mat and walk back out into the world, we don’t necessarily think about the yoga practice for very long. We jump right back into our plans, tasks, and obligations. But gradually, as the practice becomes sustained and consistent, it starts to linger a little longer in our consciousness, and begins to seep its way into other parts of our day. This is when it starts to get really good. 

For myself, the first seed that really clearly sprouted up in my everyday life was the breathing. I’ve heard many of my students say this was the first thing that showed up in everyday life for them, too. You see, I had been working with the practice of postures for what seemed like a long time, and that made my body feel good, but I wasn’t about to bust out a yoga pose in the grocery store. After a while, though, all those instructions I'd always heard about the breath started to register, and everything began to shift in a new direction. Although it took a considerable amount of time for me to get a handle on the whole ujjayi breathing thing, once I started to get it I felt like not just one little blossom had opened up, but a whole slew of them all at once. Suddenly, there was more consciousness in doing the postures, not just in the little pieces of them, but in the whole posture as one. It was like making the switch from dial-up to high speed internet: I could suddenly handle more information and make action happen in my body much faster and clearer than before. I was becoming more aware of myself. 

And then, I’d roll up my mat like always and go back into my life. But I started to notice something...different. When I got stuck in that wrong line in the grocery store, you know, the one that doesn’t move, and started to get frustrated, I noticed that I started doing that yogic breathing thing and my frustration diminished. Hm. Or, I’d be rushing around at work, starting to feel overwhelmed, and then BAM: yogic breathing again. Double hm. And once I started to take notice of this phenomenon happening in my life all on its own, I started to get excited about it and choose to make it happen more. Eventually, the tide began to turn and my use of yogic breathing in my life became more and more deliberate, more of a conscious tool I use, than something unconscious. Yet that unconscious stage is so vital: it was in making yogic breathing a habit in one part of my life that allowed it to spread unconsciously to other parts of my life. And as I began to notice that habit and reinforce it because it made me feel good, it began to push out other, less productive habits that didn’t make me feel good (like reacting with frustration at a less than ideal situation).  

So, it began with the breath and continues to evolve from there. I would say that most of the time I’m engaged in some sort of yogic breathing. I’m usually working with jiva bandha to keep tension out of my jaw and teeth. I sprinkle yoga breaks throughout my day, with a little downward dog here and little upward dog there. I even do what I can to apply what I learn in yoga to my relationships and my work. And it all started when that little persistent seed of the breath got picked up by the wind and carried over into my life. There’s still a lifetime of work to be done, and I’m glad for that. Having yoga in my life, not just on my mat, helps me to work around the usual self-limiting tendencies of my mind and act more deliberately on the mat and off. I can’t control some of the circumstances I encounter, but I can control how I breathe and move through them. Developing my connection with my breath was one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever given myself. 

So, make a commitment to yourself to bring more of your yoga into your life. Even if you already choose to breathe rather than punch someone, there’s always more to be done. Can you not only breathe consciously for a few moments of your day, but for your entire day? Can you fuel your choices, like your postures, with your breath? Can you follow your breath into a meditative state at any moment during your day? Into how much of your day can you carry that state with you? The path of this life is long, and asks of us countless steps. Each of those steps is fueled by breath. 

I’ll leave you with a short little meditation that you can try adding to your breathing practice. It’s pretty easy to remember because the mantra just shortens as you go. Each line corresponds to either one inhalation or one exhalation. By the end, you’ve taken 5 deep breaths. It’s simple. It’s easy. It’s very much yoga, baby! (While you're at it, please check out our article on ujjayi pranayama, too.)

I am breathing in.

I am breathing out. 

I am breathing.

I am breathing.

I am breath.

I am breath.

I am.

I am.  

I.

I.

NAMASTE!

Ahem, Let's Try This Again.

Any decent yoga teacher is concerned with creating action. Often times, this means figuring out many different ways to say the same thing until the instruction finally lands and there's that magical "Aha!" moment. I want some action, and I know you want to help support that nice young man's recovery, so I'm going to try this again and make it even easier.

Win 2 Free Tickets to the KryptoNight Benefit Concert for Graham Faught!

How to enter:

1) Go to our Facebook page: Facebook.com/InfinityCrossing.

2) Post a photo of one of your favorite yoga poses (It doesn't have to be you, just someone doing the pose).

That's it. BONUS: For all my off-Maui readers, I'll also offer a shwag bag of my own yummy essential oil blends of an equal value ($70). So, everybody has something to win! Winners will be drawn at random for next week's blog on Monday, April 15th. You can find more information about the concert by clicking on the poster to the right.

That's it, folks...ready, set, action!

NAMASTE!

Giving 'Cause It Feels Good

It's been a roller coaster time of late around my house. We've had the blessing of being Grief Thieves for our dear friend upon the passing of her mother. Don't know what that means? Well, I didn't either until now. You see, we define a Grief Thief as one who swoops in to steal away one in grief and turn what might have been a crisis into an opportunity to celebrate new beginnings. The funny thing about Grief Thievery is that, much like being in grief, everyday things come to a screeching halt and make room for rare gifts: the flow of normal time slows down and we have a chance to see things in a totally new light. This has been such a tremendous gift for me in so many ways, that I've just got to keep the gifting spirit going. So, in honor of the passing of our loved one, and just because it feels good, I'm doing a brand new giveaway here on the blog! 

And this isn't just any plain old giveaway. This is also a super sneak peak announcement of something BIG... Are you ready? Ok, here goes:

The Event

That's right, kids. Infinity Crossing and 1% for the 'Aina are proud to present our 1st annual benefit concert (of many more to come)! As I mentioned, this is a super sneak peak announcement, so you're hearing it first right here on the blog. This will be a stellar evening to raise support for a young man from our community, Graham Faught (learn more about him here). This is sure to be an action-packed night with music from Wavetrain, The Throwdowns, and Flashdrive, among others, Teppanyaki by Maui Executive Chef, Kombucha from Maui Kombucha, cocktails, red carpet, gifts given throughout the night, and in honor of the night's beneficiary, Graham Faught.... superhero costumes!! Yeah, it's pretty awesome. If you're interested in becoming a sponsor of this event, find more information here. 

The Giveaway

I'm giving away 2 tickets to this event to one lucky winner!! Here's what you've got to do to enter: 

Visit our Facebook page (Facebook.com/InfinityCrossing) and post up a photo of how yoga makes you feel good. Each posting is one entry into the drawing. Deadline for submissions is Monday, April 8. I'll draw a winner at random from all the entries received and announce the lucky guy/gal on next week's blog. 

Knowing me, I'll probably wind up giving away some runner-up prizes, too. So, there'll be plenty of love to go around, even for those of you who can't be here to attend the event. Now, get to snappin' those photos of how your yoga makes you feel good so we can get to giving... because that just feels so good, too!

NAMASTE!

Spinal Spiration: Disc-o Fever

Last time on Spinal Spiration, we took a closer look at the function of our Lumbar Spine and how to keep it healthy with intelligent back bends. Click that link to check it out if you missed it, because as usual, there will be very little review here. This being Part 3 of our look at the luminous lumbar spine, we'll take a look at some of the problems we can run into in that lower nether region, and how our yoga helps us keep our lumbar limber. 

A Pain in the Lower Back

I mentioned in Part 1 some gory statistics about the staggering number of Americans who experience lower back pain at some point. Back pain is a tricky beast, because it can be difficult to accurately diagnose the source of the problem. And I can't emphasize enough the importance of seeking accurate diagnosis by a medical professional if you experience back pain. Get a diagnosis, and ask lots of questions so you know exactly what you need to heal before you get to healing it. 

Disclaimer out of the way, let's look at the source of a lot of back pain: disc problems, which are more likely to occur in the lumbar spine than in any other segment.  The graphic to the right here shows you some examples of what can go wrong with our beloved shock absorbers. Certain issues, like bulging and herniation, can come from spontaneous injury, while others, like degeneration and thinning are usually a by-product of age.

Let's look at what can happen in the case of disc herniation as an example, courtesy of Dr. Nabil Ebraheim (be sure to stick around for the super lame spinal humor at the end).

Get Bendy

Now, all the bending forward and back that our lumbar spine facilitates is extremely useful: we do it all the time. Yet, it is also something of a danger zone. When we bend forward, as you see in the illustration to the right, the disc is squeezed to the back. This is fine and dandy, until you add a bit of a twist, maybe even some weight by picking up something. That's where the pressure on the disc goes through the roof, and far too many injuries to the discs of the lower back occur, like those herniations. Yegch.

Of course, there are also many ways for a disc injury to express itself. Yet, most of the time, a disc injury will be posterolateral protrusion (towards the back and to one side), from that whole bending forward and twisting thing I mentioned. But what happens when we do the opposite: bend backwards? You can see in that illustration how the "load" on the disc shifts anteriorly in extension... Enter our friend, the back bend!  

This little video has corny music but shows in almost excruciating detail what happens when we bend forward with a disc herniation, and when we bend backward. Check it out and decide which movement you'd prefer with that injury:

Easy as Saying Bhujangasana

So, perhaps you have a better idea now of how back bends actually help relieve a condition like a "bulging" disc: encouraging the disc material back to where it belongs. In fact, one of the best and simplest ways to start to heal a disc problem like this, or to relieve a weak lower back in general, is with "baby cobras." Otherwise known in Sanskrit as bhujangasana, cobra involves lying on your stomach with your palms on the floor by your lower ribs (so your wrists are under your elbows) and your legs together, toes pointing straight back. As you inhale, press your hands down, hug your elbows in, and lift your chest off the floor only as much as is comfortable. As you exhale, lower slowly back down to the floor. To facilitate the backbend, be sure to work your legs: lift your kneecaps, engage your quadriceps, spin your legs internally, and drive your pubic bone down towards the floor. The more you work your legs in back bends, the less pain you'll have in your back...trust me. Length is also critical to backbends, so as you lift your chest, draw your sternum forward as well to keep as much length in your whole spine as possible.

Do as many sets of 10 of these as you can possibly make room for in your day, and just watch your back strengthen before your very eyes. If you are doing this to simply strengthen and maintain health in your back, follow up your sets with a 1-minute balasana (child's pose) and/or gentle twists lying on your back. If you're doing this as part of an injury treatment program, do not do any forward bends (including balasana): remember that video above with the icky bulging disc on forward bend! **And I can't say it enough: if you have an injury, you better have gotten your butt to a medical professional for diagnosis and recommendations on what's appropriate for you prior to embarking on a self-treatment program!!** Yoga has many wonderful tools to offer us for healing and maintaining health in our spines. Yet, everyone brings a unique case along with a unique body. I'm offering you just one little pose that's appropriate for most people, and that I've seen to be effective over and over again. Yet,  there is an entire universe to be discovered around your beautiful back. So, if you suffer from back problems, find a great teacher who has experience working with back problems and figure out the pieces of your back health puzzle together in a hands-on way.

Hang Man (or Woman)

No piece on disc problems would be complete without mention of one of my favorite things in the whole wide world: hanging upside down. Thanks to the development of yoga props we have a few methods at our disposal for therapeutically inverting our bodies to reverse those heavy effects of gravity, which can compress our discs, thin them over time, and exacerbate any scoliotic curves that might be present. Personally, I've found immense relief from my scoliosis-related back pain in supported inversions, and I've witnessed so much healing and relief in others with similar issues and/or disc problems to boot. Hanging in a supported inversion is such a nice way to access the benefits of longer periods of time in an inversion without the effort and strength usually required for a traditional inversion from the floor. That said, inversions are not for everyone: those with high blood pressure, glaucoma, or women who are menstruating will want to avoid inversions. 

Nicki Doane in Single Rope Sirsasana

Nicki Doane in Single Rope Sirsasana

Supported inversions aren't necessarily easy to come by, either. They do require a bit of equipment. The best way to get familiar with them is to find a yoga studio with an Iyengar style rope wall and/or inversion swings, as in the photo of Maya Yoga Studio to the right. This way, you can learn how to safely and effectively use the equipment from a trained teacher, and discover whether or not it's something that's right for you before you go drilling big fat holes in your wall or ceiling. Truth be told, there are tremendous benefits to both the rope wall and the swing. The rope wall offers a whole heap of asanas usually lumped under the umbrella of Yoga Kurunta, taught in the Iyengar tradition. Yet, a swing can be much easier to install if you're the do-it-yourself type. Depending on the type of issue you're having with your spine, you will probably take to one or the other more. Personally, when I first started practicing hanging, the swing was my best friend. When I started having sacroiliac joint issues, however, the rope wall came to my rescue. Nowadays, we're all one big happy family again. This is why it's so important to really work with a teacher on these tools if you're interested in them for healing or maintaining the health of your spine. You have to be willing to go through some neti-neti, trial and error, to find what works best. So, come see me out in the jungle to get all tied up! If you're well-versed in these bondage contraptions, but have always wondered where to get them, Tools for Yoga is a great resource for both.

Well, kids, I think that's about it for the Lumbar Spine. Next time on Spinal Spiration, we'll get down real low with the Sacral and Coccygeal spinal sections. I can't wait to "hang" out with all of you real soon!

Exponential Expansion

It's Tuesday again already?! I seem to have found myself caught in a new vortex wherein space-time appears to have sped up exponentially, and the things to accomplish in that time have multiplied like so many troubling tribbles. In other words: holy busy gal, Batman! This is an exciting time with all sorts of new things starting to come to fruition and take shape. I hope to be able to introduce you all to them in the coming months. But, in the meantime, I've got my nose to the grindstone putting in a rapid fire phase of work on these grandiose projects. Oh yeah, and I just started a fresh round of 500 Hour teacher training out in the jungle to top it off (complete with 20 minute Salamba Sarvangasana on the 2nd day)! All of this has me feeling quite a bit outside my lazy, beach bum comfort zone. So, I thought we'd revisit a post about precisely this feeling in the Ever Expanding Personal Universe...

We've all heard of the comfort zone: that encapsulated space in which we spend most of our time, comfy-cozy. There are a few exceptions, of course. A small number of people seem to thoroughly enjoy pushing their limits on a regular, if not constant, basis. But for most of us, we have our own little cocoon in which we like to dwell, wherein most things are familiar, comfortable, and safe. That's great. I'm sure most of us have also heard of pushing, expanding, or even (gasp) stepping right outside the comfort zone. This is where, depending on the individual's personality, things tend to get a little fuzzy... even contentious.

I like to think of myself as a daring adventurer, exploring strange new worlds and boldly going where no one has gone before. But then I turn off that episode of Star Trek, and face reality: I like my comfort zone. In fact, I'm a pretty cautious gal. Sure, I do some things on a regular basis that a few people might think are crazy/dangerous/risky: surf, run barefoot, stand on my head, etc. But I think that in the grand scope of things, I'm much more the safety patrol than Evil Kneivel. If you ask my personal surf teacher, he could tell you about the more than a few times he's coaxed me down from my perch of uncertainty to just get in the water.

Yet, as much as I like comfort, I also really relish the rewards of gently and deliberately expanding my comfort zone. Every time I manage to put aside fear of the unknown and venture into new territory, I always walk away with the stoke: that giddy excitement, where you just couldn't wipe the beaming smile off your face if you tried. Thus, a combination of the fearful unknown and a desire to see what's just beyond the boundaries of my current personal universe led me to agree to try scuba diving this week. Yeah, that's right... scuba diving.

It. Was. Awesome. As usual with new things, I had an infinitesimally small freak out at the beginning, just trying to synthesize the means by which my state of being would transition from a land-lubber to a virtual fish (breathing through my mouth via a regulator, clearing my ears, finding bouyancy that was just right, etc.). It was actually a truly poignant kind of moment, where I had the distinct feeling that a transition like this might be similar to dying, moving from one state of existence to another, and the peace that comes along with relaxing into it was sublime. But I digress. I settled right in to this new underwater universe and wondered why I hadn't ever done this earlier. Getting to actually hang out under the surface of the water I usually spend so much time on top of did so much to calm my fear of beasts of the deep (especially after encountering 2 beautiful reef sharks) and made me feel infinitely more at home in the water. 

Ok, so what does this have to do with yoga, you ask? Well, it's all yoga, baby. Gently expanding our own personal universe is ultimately what yoga is all about. Through our yoga practices, we delve into expanding and controlling our breath, safely and consciously expanding the limits of what our physical bodies can do, and expanding our consciousness beyond the confines of the gross material world into the subtle energetic world. By paying attention and remaining ever mindful in our yoga practices, we learn how to take these lessons off the mat and into our everyday lives. Thus, the personal universe goes on expanding in ways that we might not even be able to imagine. And, wonder of wonders, the key to it all - the first step that gets us going, the last step that gets us there, and the fabric of every step in between - is to just... keep... breathing.

NAMASTE!

Sutra Sagacity I.11: Memory

Back to the books this week, kids, with another edition of Sutra Sagacity. This week, it's all in your head...

Patanjali's Yoga Sutra I.11

anubhuta - experienced

visaya - objects of sense, phenomenon

asampramosah - not slipping away, retention

smrtih - memory

Memory is the retention of experiences.

(Translation from Bryant's The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali.)

Memory is the last of the fivefold vrttis outlined by Patanjali. It is the only one that is generated from and dependent upon the other vrttis (Right Knowledge I.7, Error I.8, Imagination I.9, Nidra I.10). As to why this one is considered a vrtti, to me it's pretty obvious. It's right in the translation: "retention." Memory represents attachment to our experiences, either real or imagined, and thus perpetuates the cycle of samsara, birth and death. Our memories, like every instance of perception, form samskaras,  which are simply imprints in our citta, much like the impressions of images on film. They stick with us and we either play them over and over on the screens of our consciousness, or we store them away to be viewed later or to be long forgotten. Nevertheless, they stick around. As Bryant explains, "Since the mind is exposed to numerous sense objects all the time, and has been for numerous lifetimes, there are unlimited samskaras continually being embedded in the citta, which are potentially retrievable. [M]emories are the reactivation of the imprints of sense objects that one has experienced and recognized in the past." (Bryant 44). 

As Patanjali explained in I.5, all of the vrttis can be experienced as either klista, painful and detrimental to the path of yoga, or aklista, seemingly non-painful and non-detrimental to the path. It's fairly plain to see here how memories fit that bill. Perhaps we have memories of indulgent experiences that distract us from the path of yoga, or perhaps we have memories of yogic experiences that keep us focused on the goal of yoga. Yet, either way, our memories represent our attachments to our experiences at a very subtle level and are thus a vrtti.

As Patanjali foreshadowed for us right at the outset, yogas citta vrtti nirodah: yoga is the quieting, the ceasing of the fluctuations of the mind (I.2). As we walk the path of yoga, we shed the layers of our vrttis, and arrive at our essence. Apparently this means detaching from our memories as well. This is a troubling prospect for me, as I find it hard to imagine myself without the imprints of my experiences. It seems as though my experiences contribute to who I am, and teach me the lessons I must learn in order to find my way on the path. I suppose this is just one of those instances wherein we have to remember that while some things are indeed aklista, we ultimately have to be mindful that we don't get stuck on or with them: that we can let go of everything when the time comes. So don't go getting too attached to those movies playing in your mind: they're all just vrttis blowing in the wind. 

NAMASTE!

For Real

Ok, what's the most intense yoga you've ever done? Think about it, and picture it in your head. Got it? Good. Did it have anything to do with a yoga mat and/or class? If it did, I want you to scrap that and go a little deeper, maybe a lot deeper. Think about it again: what's the most intense yoga you've ever done? 

You see, I know that some classes can be intensely intense, and even that there are some of you who can create transformational intensity in your home practices. But that's not the kind of intensity I'm after here. I want you to find those times in your real, everyday life where you've had to use your yoga because otherwise, you might just freak right the hell out. I'm talking about those moments we have where shit gets real, and our practice is firmly-rooted enough to allow us to recognize the poo storm around us, as well as recognize our own responses bubbling up from inside ourselves. Or, perhaps we catch it a hair late and have to reel our reactions back in with more control. It's in these moments that we become fully present, breathe our yogic breath, and deal for real. Can you find those moments in your mind? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

Long-time readers will know that my mind likely went to the dentist (Better Than a Root Canal). I would say that I'm a surprisingly tough chick when it comes to a lot of things, but one of the biggest weak spots in my armor is the dentist. Like many difficult-to-control fears, it all started with a traumatic childhood experience, from which I've been slowly climbing my way back like so many Price is Right Cliffhanger dudes.

And believe it or not, I went back there yesterday! Now, I'm not entirely proud of myself for the whole thing because I was so nervous about it that I spent most of the night prior clenching my jaw in my sleep. However, I was proud of my game plan going in: to use my "yogic breathing" and meditate every chance I got. True, I was just going in for a cleaning and x-rays (which were crazy, by the way: all 3-D and everything). So, I can't really claim any great feat again like last time in managing to not crawl out of my skin during a root canal. Yet, I still had to conquer my fear and deal with all the scraping and gum poking and potential for financial disaster that comes along with a visit to such a purveyor of doom. 

This time, though, there was no doom to be found. I even got gold stars for having "the best set of teeth" he's seen in a long time. Yes, that's a quote! Admittedly, I had avoided even a full cleaning for a while, so that whole scraping and poking deal was pretty intense. Nevertheless, not only did I not come out of there with armpits that reeked of primal fear, but I actually had a couple of really nice moments of activating my yoga for real in the face of wanting to wiggle right the hell out of that chair. I even wound up getting to a couple of really nice moments in meditation. All things considered, I think I've climbed my way up a lot closer to that mountaintop of conquering my fears. And that right there, is some yoga for real.

As yogis, we do a lot of "practicing." Some people even use that to joke and say, "Oh, what are you always practicing for?" Well, since you asked, we're practicing for life. The skills we learn on our mats are not just for physical benefits and doing fun things with our bodies, though those are terrific in and of themselves. Rather, we practice on our mats to develop skills that support us in our lives, in everything from driving in traffic to disagreeing with someone we love to facing down our biggest fears.  And the more firmly-rooted our practice becomes, the more powerful a tool our yoga becomes for us. So, now I ask you again, where do you use your yoga...for real? 

NAMASTE!

Be Here Later

Now is a tricky thing. It seems as though our senses register the Now in a number of ways: how it looks, feels, tastes, sounds, and smells. And in a way, our senses do capture the Now. The problem lies in the delivery. Each of our senses has a bit of a delay in traveling to our central processing system, our brain. Many of our nerves deliver information at about 60 mph, and some are slower than that. Hearing is the fastest of our senses, with a delay of just milliseconds. That's pretty fast in our relatively small bodies, but it's still not immediate if you're talking about that flash that is the Now. Then, our brains have to process that information and make sense of it. By that time, the information we just registered is no longer actually Now. When you think about it, we're constantly living slightly in the past. 

This presents an interesting dilemma for yogis. After all, our practice promises to deliver us into the here and now with greater efficacy. So, if our very senses don't bring us the Now in real time, how can we be here now? Perhaps if we stay inside the brain, eliminate the information travel time, and think a single, simple thought that would be instantaneous. It turns out there's actually a slight delay in our thoughts as well: about a quarter of a second. There isn't a thought you can think that registers instantly. Apparently, the closest approximation we can get to being in the Now is in this realm where we eliminate conscious thought and as much as possible... just be. We have to bypass the conscious mind to get closer to the Now. Sounds a lot like meditation, right? And you know that the cats who came up with meditation had no hard scientific information about our neurons, our brains, and our sensory processing delays. It's pretty amazing when you think about it. But thinking is so in the past. Let's get in the Now! Go ahead. See if you can sit there, close your eyes, withdraw your senses, and just be. I'll wait... 

Could you do it? I know, it's so hard, right? Well, don't beat yourself up about it. You've got the rest of your life and a whole lot of practice to figure it out. Let me know how it goes. In the meantime, I'll share with you the most excellent Radiolab program from which all of this came. Those guys are always so thought-provoking. If only they could deliver those thoughts in the here and now! 

NAMASTE!

The Arc of Extension (Spinal Spiration: Lumbar Spine Pt. 2)

Last time on Spinal Spiration, we looked at the anatomy and function of the Lumbar Spine. Click on that link to check it out if you missed it, because otherwise things will get pretty hairy real fast around here. In Part 2 of the Lumbar Spine, we'll look more at function with regards to spinal extension and how it applies to creating beautiful, effective, healthy arcs in our yoga practice.

The Arc of Health

First, I want to say a few words about why we do back bends at all. The spine, being the center of our skeletal framework and the house of our central intelligence system, is pretty important to our overall health. If you've ever had a problem with your back, you know firsthand how it can easily stop your life in its tracks.

A regular practice of back bending reverses the effects of most of our forward reaching, forward slouching daily activities (sitting, typing, driving, etc.). Back bends are safe for most individuals, though some common contraindications are acute severe injuries, spinal stenosis, and spondylolisthesis. Backward bending postures proffer such benefits as:

  • strengthen back muscles
  • realign the spine
  • improve circulation, digestion, and immune function
  • build stamina and energy
  • increase lung capacity
  • prevent arthritis
  • alleviate depression.

Yes, please! With so much good stuff to be had from our back bends, let's look at the anatomy we've learned to discover how to do them more effectively.

Get Bendy

I explained in previous installments how the cervical spine and the lumbar spine facilitate flexion and extension, while the thoracic spine facilitates rotation without much give in the way of flexion and extension. Did I mention it would be helpful to read prior posts? Here is where function can really follow form, and in a negative way if we're not careful and conscious with our bodies.

Check out those two Yoga Journal covers and the difference between the two backbends. While I don't necessarily agree with all of the comments pasted on to those images, the models serve as a nice juxtaposition of two approaches to back bending. Do you see how the model on the left is giving you a pretty straightforward example of the limited extension in the thoracic, while dumping the bend into the lumbar and cervical regions that more easily bend that way? She appears to be relying mostly on her flexibility to bend backwards. Looking at the line drawn along her back, we can clearly see how the architecture of that bend is putting all of the force load into two specific points, rather than distributing it evenly, like an arc. Her lower back and neck might not bother her now or for some time, but eventually that kind of stress on those joints will cause wear and tear, especially if it's repeated over and over for a long time. 

What I would like to see her do is start the arc from the ground up, rather than starting it in her lumbar spine. So I would have her press down through her feet, bend her knees, encourage her pelvis forward by opening her hip flexors, lift her chest more, and simply let her head hang. I have to drop a great example on you here of one of my teachers, Nicki Doane, to the left. Do you see the difference in the architecture of their curves now? Do you see the space in Nicki's lumbar spine as opposed to that of the Yoga Journal model? And can you see how the arc really begins at her feet and travels evenly all the way up to her head?

On the same note, the Yoga Journal model up there on the right is executing a curve that is more evenly distributed all the way through. You can that see that she, like Nicki, is noticeably lifting her chest. This action keeps the force line of the curvature moving through the thoracic spine on its way up to the top of the spine. When the chest is dropped, the curvature stops at the juncture of the lumbar and thoracic sections, known as the "thoracolumbar junction," which is the sight of many a disc degeneration. Interestingly enough, lower back pain can actually be sourced to degeneration higher up the spine at this thoracolumbar junction, as the innervation of the lower lumbar region is provided by sensory nerves that come from the T11, T12, L1, and L2 roots ("Thoracolumbar Junction and Low Back Pain"). This thoracolumbar junction is just as susceptible to stress as the lumbosacral junction of L4, L5 and S1, where a majority of disc problems occur. Creating that space in our lumbar spines as we bend backward protects both sensitive junctions. 

Round It Out

So, the next time you get to constructing arcs in your practice, think of rainbows rather than right angles. And of course, it's always advisable to balance out your back bends with twists and gentle forward bends. Next time on Spinal Spiration, we'll take what we've learned here and start applying it to some of the more common problems we can encounter with our spines. Until then, happy back bending!

NAMASTE!

Drop Anchor!

Don't you just love the ways our lives loop around, bringing us to the same junctures over and over again until we get the lessons right? I know I do, and without the slightest touch of sarcasm. Really. It's precisely one of those loops that brought me to this moment, searching for a blog post to run out of my library because I didn't manage to find enough time to finish a new one this week. Lo and behold, it seems this is nothing of a new theme for me. With that, I give you once again, the good ole anchor! (Originally run as "Drop the Anchor" in August 2012.)

"I don't have time to do yoga." I hear that a lot. And if that's the case, how do you have time to read this post? Well, I'll help you out and make this quick. It starts with a confession: I have been in the realm of the overly busy and have not always had the time/patience/enthusiasm/whatever for a full asana practice every day.

(Gasping audibly) "Why, whatever do you mean?! You're a yoga teacher and everybody knows that all yoga teachers do, like, 5 hours of yoga a day. I'm so disappointed in you."

Well, disembodied person of unrealistic expectations, it's sad but true. I am a yoga teacher, and I don't always have time for an hour of asana, much less 5. And I don't really think I'd want to do that much asana a day, even if I had the time/patience/enthusiasm/whatever. There's just too much interesting stuff to do and see and experience... but I digress. You see, yoga is a long-distance path, an endurance run. And it only becomes firmly rooted in our lives after a long time of dedication and consistent presence in our everyday existence. So, instead of setting unrealistic expectations for myself or beating myself up about not being able to kick hours of my asanas all day every day, I just drop the anchor. "The anchor" is that one thing you do most every day that really helps keep you sane: it's your real yoga. And no, it doesn't have to be your favorite yoga pose that you just pop in to whenever and wherever shit's going awry. It can be anything: brushing your teeth, going for a run, watering your plants, petting your pet, sweeping the floor... truly anything consciously done to bring you back to center.

There is a caveat here: your anchor is anything that is not harmful to you or something else, like stuffing your face with cheeseburgers, punching someone in the face, or pounding beers in your face hole. Those are not, I repeat, not anchors. Those are just plain naughty. Rather, your anchor is a very tiny sliver of sanctuary. The anchor is often viewed generally as a symbol of hope and equanimity. Your anchor is something that grounds you in yourself so you can be still a moment in stormy seas and swirling winds.

What's my anchor? Well, that's sacred information and to speak it aloud would kill it's power... Oh, alright, I'll spill. At the moment and for some time now it's been nadi shodhana. You'll remember I shared with you a little video with that and a marma points exercise earlier in the Summer. I chose it for the video precisely because it's my anchor. It's so perfect for me: I can drop it anywhere, anytime, for a few moments or few minutes, and when I'm done, it's like I've pushed a reset button for my whole being. This will inevitably change as I change. This anchor is not meant to be a thing forced into stasis or rigidity. It's got to be something you enjoy, something that works on you in a tangible way. 

So, what's your anchor? If you think about it, you probably already have one or more. As we sail off into our seas of busy-ness, make sure you've got your anchor ready to drop. You'll probably need it. 

NAMASTE!

Sutra Sagacity I.10

Put on your thinkin' caps, kids. It's time for more of everyone's favorite intellectual aphorisms! You'll like this one: it's about sleeping...

Patanjali's Yoga Sutra I.10

Deep sleep is a state of mind resting on the perception of an absence.

Ah, sleep. I've got a hankering for some of that right now. But not before we give it some thought! This sutra is speaking to the fourth of the five-fold seemingly non-painful vrttis (refresh your memory on the previous 3: pramana, viparyayah, & vikalpah). Yes, nidra, deep sleep, is everyone's favorite vrtti. It's just so... effortless. And this isn't just any sleep we're talking about here. Nidra refers to that state of very deep, dreamless sleep.

There can be some confusion as to exactly how a seemingly unconscious state represents activity of the citta, the mind. Commentators in the yogic tradition have explained it as a state that we perceive through memory (which happens to be the next of the five-fold vrttis). You see, when you wake in the morning, you have a memory or a perception of having slept well or slept poorly or somewhere in between. Our friend Bryant goes on to explain it thusly: "In Yoga psychology, memory is the product of samskara, and samskara is caused by experience. Therefore, the memory of having slept well must relate to a state of mind experienced during deep sleep, which is recorded in the citta (Bryant, 41)."

Of larger importance, this underscores the idea that consciousness is ever-present, even where it might seem to be absent. In nidra, we are not unconscious, rather our consciousness is experiencing absence and void. In this light, the darkness of deep sleep seems a profound state, important to the balance of our existence and a taste of something more that we seek. 

It is important to note here, though, that this state does not represent the citta-vrtti-nirodah that Patanjali named as the ultimate state of yoga in I.2. That particular cessation of the fluctuations of the mind comes from the full activation of the sattva guna, or the lucid intelligence aspect, and minimization of the tamas (inertia) and rajas (action) aspects of our being (check out the gunas in I.2). However, in deep sleep the predominant guna is tamas by far, as all other activity is draped in the veil of inactivity. One does not wake in the morning from a state of lucid deep sleep in nothingness. Rather, we awake and have only a feeling of having slept well or restlessly amongst whatever dreams we might have experienced along the way.  Interestingly enough, this same line of thinking holds that the balance of the other two gunas in relation to tamas at the time of deep sleep affects whether we feel well rested (more concentrated sattvic states), frazzled and unrested (heavier rajas concentration), or tired and listless (overwhelming tamasic states). 

But, back to that experience of lucidity in nothingness. Yeah, that'd be pretty neat, wouldn't it? That's called samadhi, and that's what we're after, kids! That is the citta-vrtti-nirodah that is the be-all and end-all of yoga. It is in this state that sattva is activated to the hilt and we can be wholly, intelligently present in the cessation of the activities of the mind. Thus, dear yogis, we must not be diverted from our path by the seemingly non-painful state of nidra. This is not the nothingness you seek! Mm, but in the meantime, it sure seems nice... 

NAMASTE!

Lay Down and Die

That's something one of my teachers often says in the process of guiding a class into savasana: "Lay down and die." It's kind of funny and makes me giggle silently to myself, but it's perfectly poignant. Savas means "corpse," and thus the pose is a symbolic death, much like the arc of a full asana practice is reflective of a lifetime. Think about it: we start out very slow, remembering how to breathe and making simple movements. Then, we gradually build up in intensity to an apex of strength and awareness. And finally, we start to wind down, slowing down once more until at last we come to the inevitable, ultimate pose: death. It's a beautiful thing that our yoga practice supports our whole lives, even the end.  In fact, another name for savasana is mrtasana, where mrt means "death." Now, some people might think that a rather morbid way of looking at things, and I suppose it is. But, I don't see anything wrong with that. Death comes for us all, and it doesn't have to be a bad thing (depending on your beliefs about what comes next).

You see, for me, death has always seemed like a transition to the next phase of existence, the nature of which will be a surprise, and I'm betting a pleasant one at that. In fact, there's part of me that can't wait to find out. Not that I'm rushing into the grave: no, I rather embrace and enjoy life. It's more of a healthy curiosity, much like my curiosity of what's out in space beyond our solar system. It doesn't mean I'm jumping on the next rocket ship to go where no one has gone before, but I think it would be neat to find out someday. 

So, I love savasana, and not just because I get to lay down and relax at the end of a tough class, though that is indeed lovely. Rather, I love it because of the idea of it. I see it as preparation for finding out what's next after this life. Much as I want to be able to do yoga for the rest of my life, I want my final pose in this life to be a savasana, to consciously lay down and die. I see all of my practice savasanas as preparation for a graceful, conscious, and easy real-deal savasana. At least, I'm pinning my hopes on it...

So, perhaps you'll savor savasana a little more the next time you prepare to lay down and die on your mat. How do you want your exit from this life to be? And do you think you can manifest that for yourself with your practice? And if you often skip savasana, or don't really like it much, do you think that says something deeper than your surface opinion of a yoga pose?

I'll leave you this week with a radio program that inspired this post. It's from my favorite guys at Radiolab, who never cease to get my gears turning. This one is on, you guessed it, death. Specifically, how we'll all choose to either cling to life with everything we've got, or just let it go when the time comes. If you're wondering where I stand on the questions asked in this one, it's with the docs, to be sure. Listen to the program below.

They mention in the program an interview Terri Gross did with Maurice Sendak just before he died. You can find the full interview here. I remembered it as soon as they brought it up because it was so incredibly movingly poignant. I remember being outside with my headphones on playing this interview and getting totally misty eyed listening to it. Namely, it was his feeling of being old and at ease with what was coming next, and above all being in appreciation of the beauty inherent in the whole process. He told Terri Gross, "Oh God, there are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready." Right on. I'll see you in savasana!

NAMASTE!

Spinal Spiration: Lumbar Spine Pt. 1

Last time on Spinal Spiration, we got cozy with the thoracic spine. In case you're only just now tuning in, it's a good idea to catch up on some of the basic anatomical terms and concepts introduced in earlier installments:

Now, let's get the low-down on our lower backs: it's time for the lumbar spine! This one's a doozy, so it looks like we're going with 2 parts. In this first episode, we'll focus more on the anatomy of the lumbar spine. Next time, we'll get to know some problems and solutions for our lovely lower backs. On with the show!

Your Luminous Lumbar Spine

That's it, right there in red, kids: your lumbar spine! Pretty neat, huh? Yeah, I thought so, too. For me at least, "the lumbar spine" was the first and only terminology I had heard in regards to my spine for some time, aside from scoliosis. It seemed to be the most important part of the spine, since that's the only part anyone ever talked about. Well, now that I have a little more awareness of what's going on with this whole spinal thing, I would say it's rather well-known because more of us tend to experience problems in this area than in other parts of the spine. For example, 

When asked about common types of pain experienced in the past three months, respondents of a National Institute of Health Statistics survey indicated that low-back pain was the most common (28.4%), followed by severe headache or migraine pain (16.6%) and neck pain (15.4%) (National Center for Health Statistics).

And that population reporting low back pain makes up about one quarter of adults in the United States (Ann Intern Med. 2007). Holy smokes! Never fear, my intrepid yogis and yoginis: you have a distinct advantage in this gauntlet. The advantage is your dedicated practice and active lifestyle. Shocking, no? While it certainly doesn't make you immune, taking regular, active care of your physical vessel makes you far less likely to be included in those ghastly statistics above. Consider this: 

Adults with low-back pain are often in worse physical and mental health than people who do not have low-back pain: 28% of adults with low-back pain report limited activity due to a chronic condition, as compared to 10% of adults who do not have low-back pain. Also, adults reporting low-back pain were three times as likely to be in fair or poor health and more than four times as likely to experience serious psychological distress as people without low-back pain (National Center for Health Statistics). 

While that should make you feel a little better, like I said, your practice doesn't make you immune. It does, however, invariably make us better able to deal physically and emotionally with any pain that does weasel its way in, and most certainly speeds our recovery time and cost. 

Lumbar Spine Anatomy

Okay, we understand that the lumbar spine can be a problem area. Let's get to know it a little better in its healthy state, so that perhaps we can take even better care of it going forward. The lumbar spine is truly a magnificent structure, especially when you think about the fact that it bears most of the weight of our upper body, houses the wiring for our lower body, and allows us to bend side-to-side plus forward-and-back. Amazing!

Regarding it's specific anatomy, I think a clip is in order. I found a terrific video giving a nice overview of the lumbar spine's anatomy that I think more effectively conveys this information than my ramblings. If you read the Pada Bandha article, you'll recognize Dr. Randale Sechrest. Take it away, doc!

So, there you have it. The lumbar spine is made of 5 heavy-duty vertebrae (L1-L5), cushioned by shock-absorbing discs, and forms a concave, or lordotic, curve. It rests between the thoracic spine and our next subject, the sacrum. It feeds the electrical system down through our pelvis and legs. Oh and by the way, I found that bit about the "horse's tail," or the cauda equina to be particularly interesting, didn't you? Yes, it's a marvelous piece of engineering, indeed! Onward.

Function Following Form

It was briefly mentioned in the video that the lumbar spine bends laterally and extends and flexes, but does not allow for much twist. This is very interesting to note, and critical when we look next time at lower back pain and some of its causes.

As we discussed in previous installments, the shape of the intervertebral facet joints and spinous processes determines what type of movement will be facilitated in any given part of the spine (this is where you definitely want to read the earlier articles: see above).

We noted in The Thoracic Spine that this region facilitates twisting far more than the lumbar spine, largely due to the relatively horizontal slope of the facet joints. Now, if you look at the shape of the superior and inferior articular processes in the lumbar vertebrae, you'll see that they slope very steeply, almost fully vertically, in fact. Imagine trying to twist those vertebrae. It's not going to give much, is it? This right here, folks, is why the lumbar spine does not facilitate twisting. The buck stops at those facet joints. 

The lumbar spine does, however, allow for quite a bit of flexion and extension, that is bending forward and backward, in addition to lateral bending. You can see how the facet joints would allow for movement in these directions. Moreover, the spinous processes do not butt up against each other as quickly here as in the thoracic spine, allowing for more bend particularly in the backward direction.

To Be Continued...

So, we've had a nice overview of the anatomy of the lumbar spine. Until next time, think about how the form of your spine affects its function, and how that applies to the movement in your yoga practice. For instance, if your lumbar spine bends backward, but your thoracic doesn't, why would I ask you when we do back bends in class to distribute the architecture of your curve more evenly throughout your spine? Ponder away, my friends, until next time...

NAMASTE!

Bandhas Shmandas: Pada

Well, folks, I suppose it's time we get back to work. And to make sure we start off on the right foot, so to speak, it's time we get more familiar with our padas (feet) and Pada Bandha.

Shitkickers

It's been raining a lot around here on the north shore of Maui. So much so, I can almost watch the mold bloom before my eyes on the various surfaces of my home. Yegh. With the rain, I've busted out my Cal Bear rubber shitkickers to keep my feet toasty dry. As I hastily hop in my car amidst gusty, windblown sheets of rain, I keep my galoshes on to drive. I'm struck by how odd this feels.

You see, shoes while driving are something quite foreign to me anymore, as I usually carefully place my slippers to the side and drive barefoot (no, it's not illegal). I do a lot of things barefoot. In fact, I'd say I'm barefoot most of the time, and when I do wear shoes, my footwear of choice is usually slippers (flip-flops for you on the mainland). It is precisely this tendency of mine that makes it feel entirely strange to try to drive with shoes on my feet. I've apparently grown accustomed to feeling the pedals with the sensors on the bottoms of my feet, giving me finer control over my use of the pedals. I'm at the point now where it feels crude and clumsy to drive with shoes on: much like trying to button a coat with gloves on your hands. 

Our Fabulous Feet

This got me to thinking about how seldom most of us liberate our feet from the bondage of shoes. Think about how much you interact with the world around you using your hands. Your feet are just as intricately sensitive as your hands, only they've been dulled and atrophied from decades of shelter and non- or misuse. Don't you want to feel the ground with which you're interacting sometimes? I do.

Feet are revered in yoga, and rightfully so. It is often wistfully said that all yogis have lotus flowers for feet. The first line of the Invocation to Patanjali, "Vande gurunam charanaravinde," means "I honor the lotus flower feet of all the gurus." Practically speaking, our feet are the very foundation of our asana practice, being what is in contact with the ground most of the time. Just as we initiate a step with our feet, our feet are the first step to optimal alignment of the rest of our bodies.  

Anatomy of a Foot

Our feet are such intricate and elegant structures. The anatomy of a foot is such that I think a video explanation will be more effective at illustrating it. This clip from Dr. Randale Seacrest offers a nice overview:

The Arches of Your Feet

If I say "the arch of your foot," most of us think of that arch that runs, or ought to run, along the inner edge of the foot from front to back. It might surprise you, then, to hear that there are 2 more arches built in to the architecture of each foot. The one we all immediately think of is referred to as the Medial Longitudinal Arch, "medial" placing it towards the mid-line of the the body, and "longitudinal" meaning it runs long-ways. Next, we have an arch on the outside edge of the foot called the Lateral Longitudinal Arch. Finally, we have the Anterior Transverse Arch, with "anterior" referring to the front of the body and "transverse" referring to running crosswise. Makes sense, right?

Pada Bandha

If you've been in my class, you've no doubt heard me harp on the inner triads of your hands. This refers to three points; the base of your index finger, the base of your thumb, and the pad of your palm just below your thumb at your inner wrist. Transferring the predominance of your weight to these three points when your hands are on the ground will help you more effectively support a pose from the ground up. 

In the same way, we can utilize an understanding of the arches of our feet to work with what I'll call the triads of the feet. The three key points here are the ball of the big toe, the ball of the pinky toe, and the heel. If we press these three points down, we create the action of the three arches in our feet. Try it: one foot at a time. Then try both feet at the same time. Do you feel how pressing through those three points any amount creates a lift along the lines of the three arches? Even if it's just a feeling, and not yet something you could visually measure, you're already working your feet in a more effective way.

Finally, we've come to Pada Bandha. Stand up. Come on. Pretty please...

Okay, now bring your feet together so your big toes touch, and your inner heels touch. Lift and spread your toes: even those pinky toes. Now, look at your inner ankles. Let your toes relax back down to the floor. Did your inner ankles drop? Now, lift and spread your toes again and watch your inner ankles. Did they lift? Can you lift them more? Good. Now, with your toes still lifted, see if you can press down through the triads of your feet. Do you feel a lift in any of the three arches; maybe even in all three? Can you feel how your feet are making a dome over the floor beneath you? This is Pada Bandha! Taadaa!!

Keep all of this action and notice what the rest of your body is doing. Are your leg muscles working? Good! Are your fingers spreading along with your toes? Let them relax. Isn't it funny how, in trying to make one part of our bodies work, we wind up making something else work instead? Now, stand up tall, close your eyes, and feel Pada Bandha at work on your body all the way up to the crown of your head. Neat, huh?

Notice how the lift and the dome shape of Pada Bandha is similar to Mula Bandha. We can utilize the possibly more tangible work of our foot lock to stay in contact with the more elusive work of our root lock. In fact, it's believed that Pada Bandha directly feeds energy to Mula Bandha. Regardless of whether this makes sense to you or not, at the very minimum I think we can all agree that conscious feet are critical to unlocking consciousness at various points in the rest of our bodies. Just look at how waking up your feet lit up other parts of your body!

Work It!

I leave you with a reminder of how to work those little padas with our dear friends, the vajrasanas (little thunderbolts). A few minutes with any of these every day will help your precious feet take leaps and bounds down the path. For detailed instructions, especially if you're unfamiliar with these poses, check out my article on them: Happy Feet!

So, get out of your winter shoes and get to work this week. You've got to know by now that we'll definitely be visiting these in class! Until next time...

NAMASTE!

Lucky in '13 Giveaway!

New Year, New Site!

Your eyes do not deceive you, dear friends. We've launched a brand, bottom-spankin' new site just in time for the New Year! Go ahead: check it all out and please let us know what you think. When you're done perusing the shiny new info and fresh eye candy, we've got something else even more special for you. 

And I bet you thought gifts were just for Christmakwanzukah, didn't you? You see, we're feeling lucky around here, and think that you should, too. So, in honor of our new site, the new year, and our lucky number 13, we're giving away some love to you, our dear friends, in the form of worldly gifts...

Grand Prize

($100+ value!) 2 custom made essential oil blends, 1 Aloha Bay Himalayan Salt Aroma Lamp, and 1 Free Class with Jean Marie (choose from any regularly scheduled class).

Great Prize 

A $50 gift card for Maui Kombucha: a personal favorite of mine. Come get your booch on! And don't forget dessert...

Dandy Prize

A $50 gift certificate for Amazon.com, where you can get yoga props, DVDs, books, & even a Hutzler 571 Banana Slicer!

And because we're feeling just a little crazy, there are 4, count 'em, 4 ways to throw your name in the magic giveaway hat:

Do 1 of these things, and your name goes in the magic hat once. Do all 4, and your name goes in 4 times, and everything in between. Oh yeah! 

Winners will be announced with the release of next weekend's blog. So dive in and stay tuned!

Until then, I'll leave you with a little worksheet (you'll find it below) we do at our house upon the turn of the calendar year. In lieu of resolutions, we like to draw up a board with a broad vision for the year, just a catch-all phrase, and supplement it with a specific list of things we'd like to increase and things we'd like to decrease in the coming annum. An example from our board this past year was: increase early a.m.'s and decrease late p.m.'s. So, once we create our list, we walk away, and let it all happen. And believe it or now, now we get up much earlier and stay up late far less than in the previous year. It's like magic!

If you choose to take up this practice for yourself, put it somewhere that is within your peripheral vision on a daily basis. Use colors or images that will catch your eye and seep in to your brain. Draw it up on a big whiteboard or canvas. Make it something engaging for you, and set yourself up for success when choosing your goals. Then just let it be. Go out in the world, put in your due diligence, and marvel at how things unfold. 

With that, I'd like to so very sincerely thank you all for your readership, your dedication to your practice, and most importantly, for your resolve to build, piece-by-piece, lifestyles that are full of love, happiness, and infinite prosperity. 2012 was a terrific year. May your 2013 be exponentially better! 

Hau'oli Makahiki Hou!

And as always... NAMASTE!